


sing a song of flowers

by likeoatmeal



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Fairy Tale Elements, Fluff and Crack, Hijinks & Shenanigans, M/M, Slow Build
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-01
Updated: 2016-01-01
Packaged: 2018-05-10 20:57:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,142
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5600545
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/likeoatmeal/pseuds/likeoatmeal
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Had Merlin been paying closer attention he probably would have cottoned on faster. But life goes on much as it always has within the castle walls, which means all sorts of madness, so there’s simply nothing for him to notice for days. It could have carried on infinitely like that and Merlin might have never noticed. After so many years on constant alert for malevolent sorcerers, malicious enchantresses, and ill-intended mages, protecting Arthur from beasts and curses and the odd bewitchment, anything not immediately life-threatening falls into the background of daily life fairly easily. </p>
<p>(Or: Yet another story where Merlin and Arthur need a little magical help figuring things out.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	sing a song of flowers

**Author's Note:**

> I've been working on this story on and off for the last five years, ever since I first discovered Merlin. I dedicate this story to five years ago me, we did it girl, we did it!

If he were to ask Arthur’s opinion, Merlin would most likely be informed that everything that transpired was entirely his fault. This was, of course, the principle reason Merlin never asked for Arthur’s opinion. Though he had to endure it often enough regardless.

And yet—though he was loathe to admit it, even if it was just to himself—this time the prat would probably be right.

-

With winter thawed into a blooming spring which already holds promises of the glorious summer to follow, Merlin is happy to leave the castle behind him for a few hours in the surrounding forest. Gauis arms Merlin with a basket of empty phials and jars and lists.

Merlin half wonders if it’s sympathy or exasperation that drives Gauis—Merlin had hardly even uttered a word about what a prat Arthur was for requesting his assistance that morning and then not even requiring anything of Merlin—but he accepts the task without protest. Gauis raises a knowing eyebrow at Merlin’s easy surrender, wraps bread and cheese in a clean cloth and sends him off with instructions to be thorough in his search.

Though the majority of his time in Camelot is spent in service to Arthur, which isn’t in and of itself as terrible a fate as Merlin believed it would be in his earliest days, he enjoys aiding Gauis whenever he can. He’ll never make a proper apprentice at this rate, but he still wants to learn all he can of healing in preparation of the day when Arthur is king and magic is once again free in Camelot. Merlin wants to be ready for the day when healing crafts take their proper place again.

It’s cool beneath the eaves, the earth soft underfoot. He’s been in Camelot now almost three years, knows where to look for chamomile and fennel, where good mugwort grows, and that he’s most likely to find horehound closer to the river. The sun climbs high overhead and Merlin continues further and further into the forest. During the first decent days of spring, when Arthur had taken his knights and Merlin out on the pretext of hunting, they had chanced upon a tree with a bee hive humming away inside the trunk and Merlin is hopeful he’ll find it again today. It must be past noon when he sits against a tree trunk and eats the food Gauis sent with him. He can still hear the river over to his left, knows he can follow it back to more familiar paths if he goes too far.

He eats his meal leisurely, enjoys the not-quite-silence of the forest, the solitude, the warming air rustling the green leaves. It is easy to cast aside the frustration of pointlessly rising at an ungodly hour out in the open air.

-

He might fall asleep.

Well no, he most definitely falls asleep, which is most definitely Arthur’s fault, both for keeping him late the night before and for pulling him out of bed this morning. When he wakes the sun has moved further in the sky, the afternoon well underway. There’s still an impression of a dream behind his eyes (a forest scene: summer sunlight and the river running in the distance, strawberries sweet on his tongue and Arthur, his laughter its own type of song, his hand on Merlin’s wrist, sword-calloused fingers and steady grip—) but it fades fast in the face of consciousness.

Something has roused him, his body pinched with tension as he waits for it to come again—

“Oi—”

There, echoing through the trees, a woman’s voice, angry and desperate, “I said stop!”

Merlin doesn’t stop to think or gather his bounty, he runs off in the direction of the shouting, hurtling through undergrowth and thickets, hoping he’s not too late.

The trees grow denser the farther he runs but the shouting grows louder too, a disagreement or a struggle of some sort. He pushes through the trees and practically trips over the scene, slamming heavily into someone’s back and sending them both to the ground. It all happens very fast.

“What the—”

“Cedric!”

The man below him wheezes and curses, the wind knocked out of him and Merlin remembers the maneuver Arthur taught him to keep a man down as best he can, pins his knee to the small of his back until he goes still. He looks up and there’s a woman there—or perhaps girl is more appropriate, her face ruddy and mouth hanging open in surprise, a wiggling piglet in her arms. “Are you alright?” Merlin asks, out of breath and very hot. He does not understand how people like Gwaine and Arthur can make heroics look good when he feels like his heart is about to explode inside his chest and he’s sweating.

The girl blinks at him a few times, mouth moving noiselessly, and then squeaks, “He was going to steal Cedric.” She gestures with the piglet in her arms, who Merlin assumes is the aforementioned Cedric. Beneath him the man struggles and Merlin spares a glance to make sure the girl is more preoccupied with soothing the squealing pig than either of them. When he’s sure her attention is elsewhere he hisses a word under his breath that renders the would-be pig thief unconsciousness.

“Did you kill him?” she asks with a curious tilt of her head, and Merlin scrambles up to his feet, wiping sweat off his palms on his trousers. “What? No, no, definitely not. I think he just hit his head in the fall.”

The girl stares at him in a way that suggests she’s not as willing to turn the other way as Arthur when Merlin spins that particular line, but she doesn’t fight him on it. (At this point Merlin’s magic is a closely-guarded secret all their lives are steeped in. And what a mortifying day it had been when Arthur had looked him in the eye, painfully earnest, and said, “I know the reasons a man might keep a secret from those he trusts.” And Merlin had swallowed his own beating heart around a single, “You do?” to which Arthur had nodded, the prat that he was and the king he would be all blended in one, “I do.” It had been absolution and a promise both. The memory of Arthur’s face in that moment surfaces time and again and Merlin thinks life would simpler if he could forget the crushing weight of Arthur’s sincerity and his own relief.)

Merlin looks around the empty clearing, back at the girl, the piglet, and the unconscious assailant at their feet and figures his relaxing morning is over and done with. “Right,” he starts, patting his hands against his thighs, “Do you live somewhere around here or—”

-

Carys, as it turns out, lives a good ways off of the clearing Merlin found her in. “I saw him snatch Cedric and ran after him. But don’t tell my sister she’ll skin me alive.” She talks without pausing for breath, all her words running together. She hadn’t wanted Merlin to walk her at all but there was still something skittish to her every glance that reminded Merlin of Gwen when he first met her, something that made him insist he’d walk with her for a bit if not all the way. Cedric, who Carys proudly informs Merlin is a very smart pig, leads the way. The trees seems to knit closer together for a long while before they begin thinning again, but Carys assures him that it’s a straight walk back to the river from her home. Carys tells Merlin a little bit about herself—she lives with her sister a half-days walk from the nearest village and she’s training Cedric to perform tricks—but mostly she wants to hear about what it’s like living in a castle.

By the time they’re finally in sight of the cottage Carys calls home she’s heard a greatly abridged version of what it’s like to serve the crowned prince of Camelot and seems almost sad to see him go. Cedric squeaks happily and makes for home without a backward glance but Carys lingers at Merlin’s side. “Thank you for saving Cedric,” she says kindly, if a little awkwardly, “I wish I had something—Oh wait, just wait right here, don’t move.”

She runs off towards the cottage, brown plait swinging behind her. She disappears around the corner of the cottage, and Merlin patiently waits until she runs back into view. She’s holding something in her left hand now though he can’t make it out until she’s come to stop before him.

“A token of gratitude.” She says with a sunny smile and presents him with a small cluster of violets.

“That’s very kind but really not necessary—”

She looks expectantly up at him until he takes them from her. He tucks them into the neck of his handkerchief for lack of anywhere else to put them and her smile grows infinitely wider. She pats him twice on the shoulder the way knights do one another on the tourney field after a well faced bout and Merlin laughs, oddly heartened by the gesture.

“My lady.” He says, bowing as he was taught to do before Morgana and other ladies of the court, and Carys laughs in return, bright-eyed and pleased. “Good sir.” She replies, dipping into a clumsy curtsy. Her laughter follows him as he makes his way to the river.

-

He doesn’t think over-much about the whole thing, carries that light-hearted feeling with him back up the river until he’s found his discarded spoils and then back to the castle. He never found the honey he was after but his basket is still heavy with marigolds for weak hearts and rosemary for teeth, lavender for headaches and mint to sooth stomachs.

The violets he leaves tucked where they are, goes about the task of helping Gauis sort and prepare herbs for use and storage. It’s not until later that he gives them a second thought, after he’s been dismissed with a casual tilt of the head, after he goes to Arthur’s room to prepare a bath and lay out fresh clothes; the room seeped in golden light from the steadily setting sun. There’s a vase of violets sitting on the table, most likely brought up by a maid, starbursts of gold at the center of their purple petals.

A token, he thinks, plucking the violets from his handkerchief. There’s a small flare of surprise when he inspects them, neither wilted nor bruised from his day’s work, but mostly there’s a thoughtless satisfaction as he places it among the other flowers on the table top.

When Arthur comes in Merlin is lighting the first candles, and he stares at the flowers for a moment, mouth tilting upward for a half-second before it smooths out, quick to recount the day’s events.

Still, Merlin doesn’t miss it.

-

Had Merlin been paying closer attention he probably would have cottoned on faster. But life goes on much as it always does within the castle walls, which means all sorts of madness, so there’s simply nothing for him to notice for days.

So what if on Sunday Arthur pulls him out of the way of a startled horse that comes seemingly out of nowhere. Or that on Tuesday when Arthur’s ring has gone mysteriously missing Merlin finds it beneath his own pillow in the room off of Gauis’ chamber.

“You’d lose your head without me.” Merlin grins jauntily, flipping the ring over to Arthur. It isn’t important where he found it, just the annoyed huff of Arthur’s chest when he catches it out of midair.

“I’d lose less with better help.” But there’s no bite to the words, the shortness of their early days replaced with something new, something rough and inelegant and honest. Arthur’s carefully guarded smile on display for Merlin to enjoy as Arthur slips the heavy silver ring into place on his finger.

Admittedly, it is a bit suspect on Thursday when there’s a spinning wheel mysteriously stationed in the corner of Merlin’s quarters. The urge to touch his finger to the spindle is completely ignored, not only because it is daft, but because it is so much easier to give into the annoyance that flares to life at whoever’s clever idea of a joke it was to put a spinning wheel in Merlin’s room to begin with. He tries to magic the thing back to its rightful place in Morgana’s chambers, where it can continue its purely decorative life (because Morgana knows as much about spinning thread as Merlin does about turning straw into gold) but it doesn’t budge. Gauis doesn’t have much to suggest other than, “Remember to lift with your knees. And careful on the stairs.”

“What happened to you?” Arthur asks the next morning while Merlin serves him breakfast. His knuckles have been scraped raw where they knocked into the rough stone-face of the castle walls when he lost his footing on the stairs and Merlin doesn’t quite know what to say when Arthur takes his hand to inspect the wound more closely. Some days it feels like Merlin spends all his time inspecting wounds on Arthur’s body, knows the places where the skin is darkened by scars, knows their causes and how many nights were lost to each, sitting worriedly at Arthur’s bedside when there was nothing else for Merlin to do. And for all that Merlin’s breath still catches in his throat at the touch of Arthur’s fingers, calloused but efficient, familiar with checking men for wounds.

Merlin’s face grows warm for reasons that have little to do with the warming weather and he manages a small grin. “Nothing exciting—just, um, helped Morgana move some things.” Arthur keeps his head bent over Merlin’s hand but Merlin can imagine his expression well enough, all beleaguered exasperation. Or at least he can until Arthur’s thumb ghosts, though just barely, over Merlin’s knuckles before letting go. “You should have Gauis look at it if you can’t bother to do so yourself Merlin.” He picks up a piece of fruit from his plate. “And do try to be more careful. I don’t have time to search for your replacement.” He throws the small green apple for Merlin to catch.

Saturday Merlin finds peas beneath Arthur’s mattress, which he would have found stranger—especially considering how peas hadn’t even been served at any point during the week—but he’s too busy stripping Arthur’s bedding and taking it down to the laundress to really think on it.

It could have carried on infinitely like that and Merlin might have never noticed. After so many years on constant alert for malevolent sorcerers, malicious enchantresses, and ill-intended mages, protecting Arthur from beasts and curses and the odd bewitchment, anything not immediately life-threatening easily falls into the background of daily life.

Once animals got involved, however, it was sort of difficult to miss.

-

The rats come first. Having grown up in the country, Merlin is not a stranger to rats and he certainly hasn’t become any less familiar with them for having relocated to the city. Rats had certainly come in handy during times of curse-induced feminine, but so long as they kept their nibbly little teeth off of Arthur’s boots Merlin didn’t spare them much thought.

One might imagine Merlin’s surprise when he woke one morning to find his room teeming with them. One might have a harder time imagining Merlin’s utter bewilderment at what the rats were doing. A pair of them were straightening his books, another group was tidying his desk, the laundry left discarded on the floor wiggling itself into piles, and one particularly fat rat seemed to be darning a sock. It wasn’t the oddest thing he’d ever woken to but it was up there with the time he’d discovered Gauis transformed into a seasonal gourd.

Closer inspection reveal that the rats are…well they’re rats alright but they display a surprising amount of dexterity, ingenuity, and, perhaps most upsetting of all, a genuine desire to help. When Merlin goes to pick clothes off the floor for the day he finds that a good deal of it has actually been folded and that his boots have been buffed. They squeak happily when he accepts a pair of socks from one of them, and then carry on cleaning his room around him. And their good will doesn’t remain confined to his quarters. Outside in Gauis’ work room they’ve tidied the shelves and appear to have swept. Gauis isn’t there to witness the spectacle and Merlin can’t decide if it’s for the better. He probably wouldn’t take kindly to rats on his work station anyway.

He manages to look through a few of Gauis’ books before he can’t put off his duties a moment longer, but can’t find anything particularly useful. There just isn’t all that much written about enchanted rats. By the time he’s raced up the stairs to Arthur’s chamber he learns that the rats not only seem to know his duties, but that they’ve beaten him to them as well. Every square inch of the room has been swept and dusted, and it looks like anything that kept still long enough has been polished to a brilliant shine. Even the hangings about the bed seemed brighter, redder somehow, though Merlin draws the line at believing rats are capable of removing hangings, dyeing them and replacing them before noon’s come and gone. When it becomes apparent that there is very little for him to actually do he returns to Gauis’ chamber for one of the books on familiars and reads through it in Arthur’s room. When he looks up again, no new information gleaned from his reading, the room’s immaculate and the rats are scurrying away, possibly to muck the stables or build a new well or dye more fabric. Merlin honestly wouldn’t be surprised with anything at this point.

“I’m going to be out of a job if you keep on like this.” He tells the rat nearest to him who wiggles its whiskered face up at him good-naturedly. The rats seem to understand everything he has to say to them except for “go away” and “this is really unnecessary”. Merlin is suddenly overcome with years-late guilt about the whole rat stew business.

-

All in all Merlin could have gotten on alright with the rats. The birds on the other hand prove insufferable.

-

Merlin’s still picking flowers out of his hair when the chamber door burst open to admit Arthur. His face is red and his hair is a mess of feathers and flowers and there are bird droppings drying on his armor (Merlin hopes the rats are still on duty). “What,” Arthur starts slowly, words hissed through tight-clenched teeth, advancing one slow step at a time, “in god’s good name was all that about?”

There’s a wild daisy knocked askew just over Arthur’s ear. Merlin makes the mistake of reaching for it only to have his hand knocked away for his trouble.

He’s not entirely sure what Arthur has to be angry about. The birds hadn’t even been all that interested in him until he’d tried to come to Merlin’s rescue and started swinging his sword around. He’s really only got that nobility complex of his to blame. Merlin doesn’t get any of that out before Arthur’s scowl has shifted into a hard edged glare that leaves no room for argument.

“Next time I’ll leave you to the insipid little vermin, let them pick out your eyes for their nests, see if I help you.” Arthur’s mouth twists around something sharp that remains silent, but his eyes are—Merlin barks a laugh before he can stop himself. “Are you honestly offended I didn’t want your help?”

Arthur crosses his arms, defiant and silent, and utterly ridiculous. A terrible fondness rises in Merlin’s chest that presses hot against the insides of his ribs. “Fine, fine,” he waves his hand, “Your highness is free to save me as it suits him.”

“How gracious of _you_ to grant _me_ permission, Merlin.” Arthur grouses, errant daisy still caught above his ear. Merlin wonders if Morgana has seen him yet. She’s sure to hear word of what happened before the day is done, Merlin can practically hear her cackling at them now. He opens his mouth to try and tease Arthur out from under the lingering cloud of his bad mood when Arthur startles him into silence.

Arthur reaches out. There’s a moment’s uncertainty when he thinks Arthur is going to cuff him, but he doesn’t, instead he strokes his fingers through Merlin’s hair. For all that Merlin touches Arthur every waking day, the reverse doesn’t typically occur unless someone is bleeding. Merlin tries to remember if he fell and hit his head out on the training field when the birds attacked.

“Er.” Merlin definitely doesn’t squeak.

“You look ridiculous.” Arthur says, tone odd around the edges with something Merlin doesn’t know by name yet. There’s a single marigold pinched between Arthur’s still gloved fingers and his gaze is uncharacteristically uncertain beneath the haughtiness Arthur is capable of wearing as well as he does his armor. The sight of him makes something catch in Merlin’s throat (some nights Merlin dreams of Arthur alone in a vast darkness, reaching for a golden flower that cuts like starlight in the night sky. Some nights Merlin wakes calling Arthur’s name, not a warning but a plea, though Merlin can’t be sure what he’s asking for.)

“You’d know all about that.” Merlin replies with only a quarter of the insolence he’s trying for, taking the flower from Arthur’s grasp.

There’s a tender quiet that spans the length of a breath until Arthur drops his gaze, clears his throat, and snaps at Merlin to help him with his armor.

-

After the bird incident (which is the shortest possible way of describing an event that literally amounted to winged creatures descending on the training field in mass and honing in on Merlin like a falcon on its prey, except with less killing and more attempts to adorn with flowers), after that he’s ordered to remain in his quarters and quote, “Try not to make a greater spectacle of himself.” Under normal circumstances Merlin would be more inclined to give at the very least a token protest, but since Gwen reported that there’s an uncanny flock waiting at Gauis’ door for Merlin to emerge, he defers to Arthur’s judgment on the matter. Well as much as he ever defers to Arthur’s judgment on anything.

Gauis, who accepted the appearance of helpful rodents with a sharply arched brow and a skeptical downward curl of his mouth when Merlin swears he has nothing to do with it, is less impressed by the birds currently taking up residence outside his chambers. Between the droppings and the spontaneous birdsong at all hours, his tone borders on menacing when he tells Merlin he’s to get to the bottom of this before he’s forced to resort to unsavory methods of fowl control. There’s not much else for Merlin to do in all honesty. The rats continue to clean in his stead (which is worrisome since Arthur has appeared twice to tell Merlin off for perceived breach of orders, each time battling through the sparrows and mockingbirds that try to follow him in when he comes through the door). Merlin spends two long—and to be honest, quite lonely—days pouring over every page in Gauis’ library for all references to enchanted beasts, magical creatures, and familiars before ruling every single option out.

“Perhaps the enchantment is not on the animals themselves,” Gauis says on the third day, placing a plate of cold water fowl in the window where the birds might see it. “What can you remember doing before this all started?”

Merlin picks his head up off the table where he laid it to rest, stuffed with an overabundance of information about fire newts that he’ll probably never need, and thinks. “Well…there was something with a spinning wheel.”

Gauis’ eyebrow reaches truly impressive heights. “A spinning wheel?”

-

As so often happens with magic, everything gets a hell of a lot more confusing before it gets any clearer. In the morning the birds are nowhere to be seen and the only rat Merlin encounters as he makes his careful way up to Arthur’s chambers couldn’t care less about him.

Arthur is predictably unconvinced. He’s like a bloodhound on a scent, stares Merlin down hard despite the lack of his avian admirers, arms crossed over his chest like he’s trying to suss out how best to blame this all on Merlin.

“Merlin,” Arthur’s eyebrows draw close, “Do you mean to tell me the matter has simply resolved itself?”

Merlin shrugs noncommittally, “So it would seem, Sire.”

There may have been a bit where Merlin conferred with Morgana and they’d set the spinning wheel ablaze. Not because they truly believed it was the source of Merlin’s misfortune but more because Morgana seemed quite taken with the idea once Merlin voiced it.

“Merlin,” Arthur starts in his most condescending voice, which Merlin knows for a fact he practices, “This will not be one of those instances where you say everything is alright then attempt to sneak behind my back and do something incredibly stupid. Do I make myself clear?”

Merlin cannot physically restrain himself from rolling his eyes. It is literally impossible. “You’re one to talk.”

Arthur scowls, but since he is the crowned prince of horrible life-threatening choices, he can’t really say much else.

-

Of course, because Merlin is Merlin and doesn’t know how to be anyone but Merlin, the very next day he sneaks off into the forest. The sky is still blooming into full morning as he makes his way into the heart of the woods, the air chilled with the last vestiges of the previous night. He’s not sure what he’s expecting really. All that reading in Gauis’ chamber hadn’t turned up anything to go on, but Merlin doesn’t much fancy the idea of waiting for the next magical flock of canaries, or herd of cattle or whatever else it is that decides to attach itself to him for no apparent reason. Something’s always happening in the forest, Merlin figures it’s as good a place to start as any other. By the time the sun’s risen Merlin’s stomach is beginning to reproach him for not stopping to grab something before heading out and unhelpfully reminding him that breakfast is probably being served back at the castle. He finds a few wild berries here and there but they’re early still, small and tarter than he cares for (he despairs sometimes when he thinks of all the ways castle life has softened him). By late morning he’s willing to concede to himself that this wasn’t his best thought out plan and that he should probably head back soon. Arthur will probably be in a hypocritical strop about Merlin going off on his own and order Merlin to do something terrible like muck the stables without any additional help with his eyebrow hitched significantly (some days Merlin half-expects Arthur to wiggle his fingers midair in reference to his magic and he’s sure it’s only a matter of time).

“Lost dearie?”

Merlin doesn’t scream. Definitely not.

He could have sworn he was alone, but now he’s staring down a homely elderly woman leaning heavily on a walking stick, basket hanging from the crook of her other arm. Her cloak is an old tired shade of red, beat thin from too many washings, but her white hair is pinned as neatly and expertly as Morgana’s at any banquet. Merlin wills his heart to slow down inside his chest as best he can. “Not at all.” He looks around again, and notices for the first time that he isn’t at all where he thought he was moments ago. He should be well on his way back to the castle, but instead the forest about him looks thicker, wilder almost, the trees leaning closely together as though they’re holding council. Arthur is always telling him to watch his feet or they’ll lead him astray. “Um perhaps a bit.” He agrees, turning in a slow circle. How long could he have walked unthinking? How odd, he thinks, to have come so far without noticing. How—

“You must be tired poor dear. Have a seat, I was just about to take a small rest myself, these legs aren’t as good as they used to be.” She beckons him to sit beside her on a fallen log and Merlin goes, still thinking, trying to work loose the knot of his memories but it doesn’t give. There’s something, he knows there’s something, he’d been searching, or maybe—

The elderly woman is talking to him again, but he can’t quite catch hold of the words, “Hmm?” he asks, and hopes she doesn’t think he’s rude. He breathes deep, or tries to, the air is…stuffy, warm and still. Maybe it’s that that makes thinking so difficult here.

Merlin almost asks her if she feels anything odd—had he been looking for something odd? He is odd, Arthur is always saying as much, maybe Merlin had been looking for himself. He almost laughs at the thought, it sounds like the sort of thing the dragon is always going on about—but the old woman smiles, tart as an under ripe berry, “I asked if you would like an apple.” She repeats, offering Merlin an apple, its skin red as unwatered wine. It almost shines under the sunlight.

There is something not right here, Merlin can feel it, he really can, it’s there, just under the surface of it all. But it’s like trying to skim oil off water, frustrating and fruitless. No matter how hard he tries Merlin can’t quite get clear of his confusion to make out whatever is lying underneath.

And, he remembers with a literal pang in his belly, he is starving. “I don’t have any money.” He says, feeling somewhat oafish, his tongue thick behind his teeth and almost impossible to maneuver. (Gwaine will laugh at him, he thinks suddenly, because Merlin can never hold his drink— _but I’m not drunk_ , a small faraway part of Merlin reminds him, but Merlin can hardly hear him at all.)

“Oh none of that love, I’m happy to share.” She smiles again and Merlin thinks she has far too many teeth for a single mouth to fit, but then the apple is in his hand, smooth and firm and cool to the touch, and he is hungry.

The red skin gives with a resounding snap beneath his teeth.

-

“Something you’d like to tell me Merlin?” Arthur asks, face still pale with something that strays dangerously close to worry, and Merlin, coming rapidly aware of the forest floor beneath him and Arthur’s hands clutching at him, cannot catch his breath. His hearts beats furiously inside his chest, blood rushing inside his veins so quickly it hurts, as though he’s been knocked awake in the midst of his whole body coming back to life from utter stagnation. He blinks, the whole world a shock of golden light. It’s not the pale gleam of early spring sunlight, instead it’s as though the air itself where choked with gold dust, every single part of it branded with its own softly glowing magic. It would be beautiful if not for the bruising pain in his chest, like he’s been stampeded by a group of raging griffins.

“Merlin?” Arthur asks again, still leaning over him, and oh, he’s lovely too, skin set ablaze, shining with magic, his hand warm against the side of Merlin’s face. There’s a sigh that gets torn ragged in Merlin’s throat—his raw and aching throat, it feels as though he’s been swallowing glass—gets expelled as a cough that makes the hurt increase tenfold and then Arthur’s helping him upright to keep him from choking on air, which is admirable, since choking on air would be a pathetic way to die even for Merlin. His hand pats Merlin’s back with all the finesse of one who has obviously very little experience being either comforting or gentle, but his face still has that pinched look he’ll deny to his dying day and when Merlin shrugs his hand off he feels worse for it.

“If you’re done quite done,” Arthur starts again once Merlin’s breathing has settled into something like normal (and if Arthur’s hand is once again heavy where it lays against Merlin’s back neither of them mentions it), “Would you care to explain what you’ve managed to land yourself in this time.”

Merlin gapes at Arthur like a gutted fish, unsure of where to even begin. There’s the lingering taste of apple at the back of his tongue, almost cloyingly sweet, but he doesn’t know what any of it means. Not the apple or the birds or the rats or the—

He’s pulled out of his utter bewilderment when he notices that Arthur’s motioning towards their feet. This time Merlin does start coughing again.

At their feet are two hares, a fox, three squirrels, a very fat boar, and what looks like the beginnings of a rather impressive sepulcher.

All parties come to a standstill once they realize they are being watched. One squirrel approaches cautiously, gives Merlin’s boot a sniff, squeaks, and then the whole lot of them scamper off into the woods.

Arthur shifts his surprisingly calm stare from the incomplete tomb back to Merlin and clears his throat. “Right then, you were saying?” Merlin blinks a few times and the golden glow about Arthur dims a bit, goes fuzzy and soft as though Merlin were seeing it from a distance. Arthur looks better now than when Merlin first woke, the weight of his hand heavy and sure between Merlin’s shoulder blades.

“Uh…”

Arthur sighs. “Maybe start from the beginning.”

“Er…”

-

Arthur just about drags him back to the castle. He threatens to pick Merlin up and sling him over his shoulders like a sack when Merlin attempts to make a case for investigating the forest further, goes so far as to bend his knees while tightening his hold around Merlin’s shoulders, but Merlin flails and slaps him away because after everything he refuses to be carried like a rescued damsel to boot.

Never one to be put off, Arthur takes Merlin’s arm over his neck, keeps his own arm slung around his back and helps him until Merlin’s legs stop wobbling quite so badly with each step he takes (and even then, within sight of the castle, he’s never more than an arm’s width away, fingers at Merlin’s elbow to keep him steady. Merlin would be more annoyed at being coddled if he weren’t still trying to figure out what in the name of sanity just happened back there).

His head hurts for the effort.

Gaius is as unimpressed by it all as Merlin is miserable. “I feel like I went swimming at the bottom of a tankard.” He mumbles, feeling wrung out all over, and Gaius hurrumphs and busies himself with making something foul smelling for Merlin’s headache. Merlin really needs to find people who are capable of expressing their concern less volatile ways.

Arthur hovers while Gaius examines Merlin, poking at him and examining his eyes closely. “And you say he was completely nonresponsive when you came upon him in the forest, your highness?”

Arthur’s jaw is tight, his mouth an unhappy line. “Right. He was babbling something about an apple on our way here, but I saw only one set of footprints when I followed him.”

Merlin listens to Arthur’s account of what happened, still turning over the mornings events. Nothing seems to line up. “Wait—” he says, interrupting Arthur as he repeats Merlin’s words back to Gaius. “Wait, how did you wake me?”

Arthur and Gaius both turn to look at Merlin. Then Merlin and Gaius turn back to Arthur.

”Yes you didn’t say.” Gaius says.

Color rises in Arthur’s face, pink as a rose mallow, and he adverts his eyes quickly. “I’m not sure what woke him. I just shook him until he did.”

Gaius fixes Arthur with the sort of look that could skin a cat. Merlin’s just glad to not be on the receiving end of it for once.

-

”Wait—what?”

Gwen’s face scrunches, her eyes bright with amusement. There’s a mess of different colored thread in her lap that she completely stops sorting to look at Merlin closely. “You got lost and when you woke animals were trying to embalm you?”

Morgana snorts in a decidedly unladylike manner, stabbing her needle through the unsuspecting piece of linen in her hand. She’s been working on the same handkerchief since before the winter set in and Merlin can’t say there’s any progress he can see, but he suspects that has more to do with the fact that she and Gwen spent the majority of the winter stealing away to the empty rooms in the southernmost tower to practice their sword work rather than the difficulty of the piece itself.

”If I didn’t know any better Merlin I’d say someone’s cast a love spell on you. And very poorly too.” Morgana says, grin teasing at the corners of her mouth as she gives up the pretense of sewing entirely.

Merlin sputters. “What—no, who—” This is really the sort of thing that happens to Arthur, usually when some foreign lord looking to marry off their daughter sends an envoy.

”This usually happens to Arthur.” Gwen muses lightly, tidying another skein of thread. “But I suppose it was only a matter of time before you got your turn Merlin.”

Merlin covers his face with his hands. Morgana tsks. “Being dramatic won’t solve this Merlin. Now think: Who have you met recently who might be interested in casting a love spell on you?”

Merlin uncovers his eyes and stares at Gwen’s concerned face and Morgana’s entirely too pleased one before catching sight of the violet thread in Gwen’s hands.

Well bugger.

-

“Oh hello there!” Carys smiles cheerily at the sight of him. She seems genuinely happy to see him and Merlin gets no sense of danger from her. She’s hanging laundry out to dry, but Merlin notices that she isn’t using pins to keep the clothes on the line. It reminds Merlin of his mother, of Ealdor, of a time and place he left behind him long ago though it’s been less than year since last he saw it. “So it worked then?” she asks, still occupied with the task at hand, “No need to thank me by the by, it was my pleasure.”

She smiles at him so brightly Merlin almost smiles back but then he remembers why he just spent the entire morning traipsing through the forest.

Merlin feels his face contort into what Arthur has informed him is a prime impersonation of a floundering fish and manages to spit out, “You have magic?”

Carys gives him a look like she’s not sure Merlin’s got anything where his brain ought to be. “Like you don’t?”

Merlin feels all the blood drain out of his face. “It’s not something you just go about announcing. What with the king’s ban—”

“I’m hardly announcing it. I was just repaying a favor.”

“By trying to kill me?”

Carys stops hanging clothes and peeks out at him from behind a large patchwork linen, staring hard. “It got that far?” She almost seems impressed.

“Yes it got that far in _killing_ me.”

She tuts her tongue, “You were hardly even dead—” Merlin makes a sound like a strangled hen, but Carys just talks over it, “So there’s no need getting all bent out of shape about it. Besides if you did end up almost dead it’s only because you ignored every other sign that came your way. The important part is that it worked, didn’t it?” She finishes confidently, pinning yet another shirt to the line.

“ _What_ worked?” Merlin so rarely gets the chance to speak to other sorcerers who aren’t trying to kill him, he doesn’t really know what to make of it.

“The charm. To find your one.”

“My one what?”

She ducks out from behind a large skirt obscuring her from view to fix him with a sharp look that told him she was reconsidering her opinion of Merlin entirely. “ _Your one._ Y’know, your perfect match, your better half, your personal knight in shining armor.”

Merlin doesn’t even know what to make of that. Apparently he gives off the immediate first impression that he’s unlucky enough in love to require magical assistance. Which isn’t his fault really. There isn’t that much time for seeking out romantic companionship when he’s constantly polishing armor and mucking stables and fending off malevolent forces threatening the livelihood of the kingdom. And when there is a moment he’s assisting Gaius on his rounds or helping Gwen spool endless yards of lace or arguing with Morgana about whether scrying with animal entrails is really still a relevant practice or just watching after Arthur on the practice field even though he’d been given the afternoon off. But he can’t very well explain any of that to her. He can’t even explain that last one to himself.

Carys carries on talking, unaware of Merlin’s internal dialogue. “…my nan’s book is full of stuff like that, apparently it was all the rage when she was a girl. Silly stuff mostly, it’s hardly even magic. The flowers carry the charm inside them you’ve just got to coax it out—”

“Well—er—thanks but no thanks. I’m good. Not really in the market for any one just now, so if you’ll just undo it—”

She laughs a little at that, stops hanging her laundry to place both hands on her hips. “It’s a good thing you’re kind because you’re not particularly bright. Haven’t you been listening? There’s nothing to take off.”

“But you just said—“

“I said it worked. You’re here!”

”Love enchantments are against the old religion, you must know—”

”You’re still not listening are you? A charm like that can’t make someone fall in love, it just brings to light what’s already there. Have you never read a story in your life? True love’s kiss the spell shall break and all that muck? ”

“But I never got a kiss. I got a rather terrible nap and birds all over the place and rats doing my job better than me—“

Oh.

“I take it from that face that you’ve clued in yes?”

His shoulders sag. “A dragon didn’t put you up to this by any chance, did he?”

“What’s that?”

“Nevermind.”

-

Oh course the most ridiculous bit of the whole enterprise is having to explain to Arthur that everything’s been set to rights, no really there’s no need to go charging anywhere with his stupid sword drawn, picking fights with anything that breathes.

Arthur’s eyebrow rise steadily as the conversation goes on, going from natural skepticism to blatant incredulity that borders on the offensive. Alright, it might partially be Merlin’s fault for cobbling together bits and pieces of various previous adventures that had proved entirely more exciting than “helped a novice sorceress sort her laundry.”

“So it’s all taken care of then?” Arthur asks after Merlin has completed his not-entirely-false retelling of events, and Merlin nods affably. “Seems like.”

All in all not the most exciting conclusion to any of their mishaps together but most definitely too ludicrous for Merlin’s liking, though he’ll keep that thought to himself for the time being.

Merlin hovers in the door for a moment, considers his words carefully before he ventures, “The violets—they weren’t brought up by a maid were they?”

Arthur’s face shifts, whatever he meant to say thrown aside as the gears of Merlin’s mind go furiously about their work. “Vio—I don’t know Merlin, I don’t take much notice of that sort of thing, I figured you’d put them there, it seemed like a thing you’d do.” For all his bravado, there’s color rising in his face, a shyness to his voice. It reminds Merlin of the first time Arthur caught him playing with his dogs or those early pre-dawn mornings when Arthur rises early for patrols and Merlin with him, when he comes back to find Merlin sleeping in his chamber, folded over the table or, though it was just the once, buried beneath the blankets on his bed, and rather than chastising him, he stares at Merlin with something so akin to fondness that Merlin doesn’t know how to feel.

He’s still not sure how he feels.

Carys was right when she said they’d made a mess of things. Merlin owes her a dozen more chores.

“There’s a language to flowers, y’know,” Merlin says though he hardly knows what he’s saying before hearing the words for himself, “Violets mean all sorts of things, good things, like loyalty and faithfulness and trust.”

Arthur stands and stalks over to Merlin. This time Merlin doesn’t flinch when Arthur’s hand cups his face, warm and calloused. Arthur leans in closely, peers at Merlin’s face. Merlin’s heart bruises itself against his ribs. “Did you hit your head during your jaunt through the forest and forget to tell me about it?”

Merlin rolls his eyes, but he doesn’t bat Arthur’s hand away. Instead he covers it with his own to keep it in place. “You’re a complete prat. In just about every way, did you know that?”

Arthur’s still eying him, wary like he’s been taught to be of everything, but his fingers are steady on Merlin’s cheek. “Well you certainly have made it your duty to remind me. It’s the only duty you preform with any kind of competency; really, it’s a wonder you’re not in the stocks more often.”

Merlin grins. If anyone wandered upon them right now they would take them for complete fools, standing toe to toe in the middle of the room, Arthur’s hand on Merlin’s face. “How did you really wake me when you found me in the forest?”

It would be easy to miss the sudden tensing of Arthur’s shoulders, the way he holds his head a bit higher, slips into the skin of haughty prince Merlin’s seen him shed often enough to recognize it for it is. Not all armor is made of iron and steel.

Almost from the first moment he arrived in Camelot, Merlin’s business has been Arthur. Fetching his meals and tidying his quarters and straightening his clothes—which frankly Merlin never understood how a man could be expected to lead others in battle but not to dress himself, but that’s nobility for you—his everyday structured around Arthur. But more than that Merlin is there to tell him off when he’s rude, and tease him out of his brooding, to play dice when he’s confined to his bed with an injury, and listen on the rare occasions Arthur allows himself to speak, not as a prince but as a person.

Arthur opens his mouth, the corner already curling with something abrasive, but whatever he planned on stops short when Merlin’s hand closes on his wrist. Merlin knows Arthur, as his destined charge, of course, a promised king to bring magic back to Albion. And as a friend. “It wouldn’t have worked if it weren’t already true.” He says and Arthur’s brow creases with confusion, but he doesn’t step back, doesn’t do anything at all when Merlin leans forward and kisses him, slow and careful, his heart beating so hard it hurts inside his chest.

He remembers Arthur hemmed in with golden light, the forest ablaze with magic. He can’t see it now but he can feel it, the fizzing warmth of it just beneath the thin skin of their lips. When he pulls away Arthur’s face has gone wonderfully soft and his mouth is pink and Merlin grins so wide his mouth physically aches.

“Were you ever planning on kissing me again or were you just going to wait until I fell into another enchanted into sleep-like-death? Because if that’s the case I don’t see how this is—“

Arthur barks a quick indignant laugh, sputters, “Oh shut up Merlin,” and then promptly sets about shutting Merlin up by smashing their faces together. It’s rather lovely though probably not particularly picturesque.

”Wait does this have to do with all the other madness that’s been happening around here?” Arthur asks when he pulls away, looking a little bit worried. Merlin presses another kiss to the corner of Arthur’s mouth just because.

”You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”

Arthur strokes his fingers through Merlin’s hair. It feels wonderful. “Try me.”

-

The End

**Author's Note:**

> If you made it to the end, thank you for reading! And a happy New Year!


End file.
